


improbable

by themorninglark



Category: Yuri!!! on Ice (Anime)
Genre: Gen, Instagram references, M/M, Seung Gil POV
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-11-27
Updated: 2016-11-27
Packaged: 2018-09-02 14:57:32
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,961
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8671840
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/themorninglark/pseuds/themorninglark
Summary: The first words Phichit Chulanont says to Seung Gil in over a year are, "You literally have only one photo on your Instagram."





	

**Author's Note:**

  * For [manta](https://archiveofourown.org/users/manta/gifts).



> Please enjoy this combination of maximum grump and maximum sunshine.  
> For Winny ♥ happy birthday, my dear friend!

 

 

_**phichit+chu** started following you._

_**phichit+chu** liked your photo._

_**phichit+chu** commented: is that ur dog??? WOW!! WHAT A CUTE_

 

 

* * *

 

 

The first words Phichit Chulanont says to Seung Gil in over a year are, "You literally have only _one photo_ on your Instagram."

He's leaning over the armrest of a plush leather sofa in the hotel lounge, legs stretched out to either side on the floor in a halfway sort of messy split that offends all of Seung Gil's sensibilities, and he's wearing a tiny little frown on his face that could almost be a pout.

Seung Gil can hear him perfectly fine over the Beethoven symphony playing in his headphones. He pretends not to hear anyway.

Phichit plops his chin down on his hands and looks up accusingly at Seung Gil.

"And you never replied to my comment."

Seung Gil closes his eyes.

"The answer was obvious," he mutters.

" _Aha_ ," says Phichit, and Seung Gil can _hear_ his face lighting up. "So you _saw_ my comment!"

"I will ask my assistant coach to show me how to turn off notifications," Seung Gil says.

Phichit laughs. "Well, you won't get any more if you don't upload more photos."

Seung Gil considers this, and decides he won't upload any more photos.

"I'm so tired…" Phichit's voice trails off into a yawn. Seung Gil hears him shuffling round the carpet, and cracks an eyelid open to peek; Phichit's come out of that almost-not-quite split and is now slumped cross-legged near the coffee table, scrolling through his phone. "The food on the plane was _so_ bad and I didn't sleep at all. Now Yuuri's sending me photos of _katsudon_!"

Seung Gil turns up the volume on his music, stares out blankly at the weird Cubist artwork hanging on the opposite wall, and evaluates his situation.

 _fact._ Phichit is drawn to other skaters like a fly to honey, one of those friendly, _sociable_ types;  
_fact._ there are no other skaters in sight;  
_fact._ he's made the irreversible error of already responding once, so even headphones won't save him now.

There is, Seung Gil estimates, an approximately 63% chance that Phichit will keep hanging out here. He might also keep trying to _converse_ , but Seung Gil doesn't have sufficient data to compute the likelihood of that.

Still, arriving at the decision that the odds of remaining peacefully isolated are not in his favour, he starts to get up off the couch to go join his coach at the check-in line instead.

But it's Phichit's coach who calls out to him first, and it's Phichit who springs to his feet, waves a cheery goodbye and says, "It was nice to see you, Seung Gil!"

Seung Gil watches him go, bemused.

He thinks, there wasn't anything particularly nice about it, but whatever floats his boat.

 

 

* * *

 

 

_We need to stop meeting like this._

_…I've never met you before._

_Ouch, that hurts, Seung Gil!_

_I have to go._

 

(On hindsight, it was probably nicer than their first meeting. Their first real meeting.)

 

 

* * *

 

 

It took Seung Gil a while after that to remember who Phichit was, and much as he would have liked to credit his excellent memory for the accomplishment, the reality was much more prosaic; his coach had sent him a list of the skaters he'd be competing against in Tokyo, and he had turned to YouTube for a video of Thailand's Phichit Chulanont.

At seventeen, no longer a fresh senior debutant, but still young, still unheralded, Seung Gil watched, and _remembered—_

_Oh. Celestino's other skater._

At sixteen, it had not been Phichit but the other one of Celestino Cialdini's charges that he'd noticed at first, sized up as someone to aspire to. It had been Katsuki Yuuri, the pride of Japan, that Seung Gil kept his eye on that day in China. Naturally.

He had gone out for hotpot in the evening, and he had bumped into Phichit near the bathrooms at the restaurant, and again the next day, this time emerging from the men's room at the ice rink as Phichit was going in.

 _We need to stop meeting like this,_ Phichit had said, laughing.

Finally piecing it together, one whole year later, Seung Gil still had not really got it. It wasn't like he was trying to meet Phichit anywhere at all. As far as he was concerned, the bathroom wasn't a worse place than any other; at least it permitted him to beat a hasty retreat.

Now, they are twenty, and they are meeting in all kinds of other places on and off the ice, and Phichit's sunny smile is unfortunately lodged in some corner of Seung Gil's mind, like one of those annoying grains of sand he can't get out of his shoe at the beach.

 

 

* * *

 

 

"But why would you even wear _shoes_ at the beach?" Phichit asks.

"I don't understand what else you would wear at the beach," Seung Gil says, stiffly.

" _Slippers_ , Seung Gil, slippers! If you don't own a pair, we need to go _shopping_!"

"…That's not the point. The point is, why are you sitting here?"

Phichit looks down at his tray. His plate's piled high with scrambled eggs, a hash brown, and more than enough of those little cocktail sausages to exceed a 20-year-old male athlete's recommended sodium intake for two days; Seung Gil would know.

"Because I'm eating breakfast?" Phichit ventures, a hopeful grin on his face.

"This table's taken," says Seung Gil.

"By _who_?"

"Me."

"Just you? What about your coach?"

"Just me," Seung Gil repeats. He turns his attention firmly back to his newspaper, his bowl of oatmeal, and the banana he has saved for later.

"Great," says Phichit brightly. "That means this seat's empty!"

Seung Gil, a retort on the tip of his tongue, looks up to see Phichit taking a photo of his hotel breakfast, and decides it really isn't worth his time to continue this fruitless argument.

 

 

* * *

 

 

_**phichit+chu** commented: hey u shld follow me back!! ^__^_

 

 

* * *

 

 

Seung Gil stares down at his phone. He promptly switches it off and puts it back into his bag.

"Assistant Coach Chang," he asks, as he bends over into a hamstring stretch, "what benefit do I gain from following people on Instagram?"

"None at all. If it's you," says his assistant coach flatly. She uncrosses her arms, goes to stand behind him and presses the heel of her palm into his back, gentle at first before Seung Gil feels the pressure increase, sure and steady.

Seung Gil exhales, and brings his forehead closer to his knee. "What do you mean?"

"It benefits people who are interested in the lives of _other_ people."

"Oh," says Seung Gil.

"You're not even interested in what you wear out of the house."

This much is true, and Seung Gil isn't even particularly ashamed of the fact.

"I'm interested in Jin," he says.

"Your dog doesn't count. And he doesn't have Instagram," Assistant Coach Chang points out, with an extra hard push that makes something go _crack_ in Seung Gil's shoulders.

He stands up, rolls them back and forward, and permits himself a satisfied nod. As he shucks off his jacket and heads out onto the ice, he passes by Phichit, who's standing near the TV with Coach Celestino.

Phichit gives him a wave. He cups his hands round his mouth, like he's going to shout some kind of encouragement.

Seung Gil walks on, sparing him only a brief glance.

What comes out of Phichit's mouth is, "Come take a selfie with me after the competition!"

 _Like that'll happen_ , thinks Seung Gil.

 

 

* * *

 

 

He has no idea how it happens.

 

 

* * *

 

 

_**phichit+chu** tagged you in a photo._

_**phichit+chu** mentioned you in a comment: @seung-gillee rocking the dark brooding hero look!!!! #phichit #Ontario #seunggillee_

 

 

* * *

 

 

It's too warm indoors, so Seung Gil goes out in search of the falling snow.

It's strange, perhaps, to think of Ontario as _too warm_ this time of year; November in Canada would be unforgiving by many other standards, but for Seung Gil, who grew up in the mountains of Pyeongchang, it is reminiscent of deep winter nights walking down winding paths, crisp, clear days spent down by the banks of a frozen lake, putting on his first pair of second-hand skates.

Out on the rink, things make sense. The scores are what they are. He knows where he stands, and how far he needs to go.

Off the rink, things really don't make any sense at all.

He feels a snowball hit his back then, and turns, with a sinking feeling that he knows who it is. He hears him before he sees him, a gleeful giggle that melts the ice around them.

"Sorry!" Phichit calls, sticking his head out from behind a pine tree.

Seung Gil picks his way across the slushy ground to him.

"You. _Dark brooding hero_?" he repeats, verbatim.

Phichit has the grace to look a little sheepish. "I couldn't help it."

Seung Gil frowns.

"Ah, there it is, you're doing it again—"

"I am not."

"Though," Phichit barrels on blithely, "I guess that's kind of just how you look all the time. But Seung Gil, do you know how many likes that picture got? You _really_ ought to see!"

"I don't know what a _like_ is," says Seung Gil.

Phichit huffs out an exaggerated sigh. "You're impossible," he says.

He steps out onto the walkway next to Seung Gil, hugs his jacket tight around him with one hand, and reaches for his phone with the other. "Here. Look, there are nearly 3,000 likes now!"

Seung Gil studies the image in front of him.

"I have over 3,000 of those hearts on my photo with Jin. Is that a lot?"

Phichit's eyebrows shoot up.

"That doesn't count," he says smoothly, waving an authoritative finger in Seung Gil's face. "Everyone knows pictures of dogs get a 1.5x multiplier at least. But cats get _2x_."

Seung Gil lets out a long, helpless exhale. He can see his breath on the still air, a warm, pale mist that fades as quickly as their time here, their time on the ice; they only have these few years, those few minutes, and he has done every calculation down to two decimal points to make the most of it.

He did not count on a distraction so persistent. It has found him anyway.

"Is this a real formula," he asks, "or did you just make it up?"

Phichit's flush deepens.

"Of course it's real," he says, eyes twinkling, elbow jostling Seung Gil's.

His laugh rings out, snowflake-clear, crystal-bright, and then he sneezes. His nose is as pink as his cheeks in the cold. He's always been smaller than Seung Gil. Up close like this, he seems smaller, slighter still. Seung Gil has never noticed how much taller he is, especially in sturdy, thick-soled boots; Phichit, like an idiot, is wearing an old pair of sneakers.

Seung Gil could not wear sneakers in the snow. His socks would get wet. His toes would get wet. He would hate that. No wonder Phichit's sneezing.

Carefully, Seung Gil unwraps the sky-grey scarf from round his neck and hands it to Phichit.

"Don't get sick," he says, and turns to go back to his room before he can change his mind.

 

 

* * *

 

 

_**seung-gillee** @phichit+chu with a cat we found behind the hotel. Like to disprove a theory._

_**phichit+chu** @seung-gillee what theory???_

_**seung-gillee** @phichit+chu I am sure my photo of Jin will have more likes than this cat._

_**phichit+chu** @seung-gillee FIGHTING WORDS!!! #phichit #catsofinstagram #cats_

 

 

* * *

 

 

( _Regret_ , Seung Gil finds, is much easier to stomach when you have your notifications turned off, and when you've made your peace with the idea that some battles are a mathematical improbability.)

 

 


End file.
